Heidi wakes up after a late night to studying for a midterm in her favorite clas
ID: 54477 • Letter: H
Question
Heidi wakes up after a late night to studying for a midterm in her favorite class, immunology, and realizes she forgot to remove her contact lenses last night. She notices that her right eye is itchy and blood shot. After treating her eye with a couple of drops of Visine-Allergy, she carefully washes her contacts and places them back in her eyes. As the day progresses her right eye continues to be irritated and begins to accumulate a thick, purulent material medially. Moreover, her left eye begins to bother her. In the afternoon she is persuaded to pay a visit to student health where she is given antibiotic drops, told to avoid rubbing her eyes, wash hands frequently and wear glasses for a week. What is Heidi suffering from? Based on the many things you know about the innate immune system, speculate why sleeping with contacts led to this infection? What was the composition of the purulent fluid that accumulated in her eye, and why did it accumulate?Explanation / Answer
Our eye produces tears when we are awake, which is absent during sleeping. Tears are washout the accumulated dust and bacteria from time to time. If we leave contact lenses when we sleep, the bacteria may accumulate, which trigger an immune response.
Innate immunity is what we have by birth. The innate immune components of eye include eyelids, epithelial barriers, tears, nerves of cornea, keratocytes, neutrophiles and cytokines, lysozymes. In this case, the reason for purulent fluid (pus like accumulation) is bacterial infection. The composition of this purulent fluid include plasma, neutrophiles (both active and dead), fibrinogen, parenchymal cells, and other dead cell debris.
Related Questions
drjack9650@gmail.com
Navigate
Integrity-first tutoring: explanations and feedback only — we do not complete graded work. Learn more.